Last Saturday, Venezuela’s dictator, Nicholas Maduro, temporarily missed his rendezvous with Satan. Two “drones” that were evidently meant to kill him as he made an address to a military parade exploded close enough to hurt bystanders, but left Maduro unscathed.

This weekend’s attack may be the first time assassins gunning for a top political figure utilized unmanned aerial vehicles. But, it will surely not be the last.

Indeed, the ever-increasing proliferation of such devices and their relatively low cost means that the job of protecting the president of the United States, his foreign counterparts and countless other high-value targets will inevitably become more and more difficult. Add in that drones are being miniaturized, enabling them to perform a range of covert surveillance missions and offensive operations, and the imperative of developing means of detecting and defeating them takes on the utmost urgency.